


until it folds in my hands

by debacle



Category: Free!
Genre: Alternate Universe, Crime, M/M, this was not what i intended, way more fluffy than necessary, what swimming anime needs is more armed robbery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-26
Updated: 2013-07-26
Packaged: 2017-12-21 09:29:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/898685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/debacle/pseuds/debacle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the job was finished, he’d looked at Rei and beamed, saying, “Well, I guess you’re officially my accomplice now!”</p>
<p>Or: Nagisa is really enthusiastic about crime, and Rei gets dragged along for the ride.</p>
            </blockquote>





	until it folds in my hands

**Author's Note:**

> So this is a completely unnecessary crime AU featuring way less crime than I intended and way more fluff. But exactly as much of Nagisa being a human barnacle. I intended every bit of that. 
> 
> I'm too lazy to make sense.

Rei is stiff as a board, sitting on the edge of the hotel bed massaging his kneecaps like he’s afraid he’s gonna have to get up and run any minute now.

This is, admittedly, a possibility, but Nagisa doesn’t think it’s very likely. He’s fairly certain that nobody followed them here, fairly certain that no one could identify them. The two of them are hours and hours away from the scene of the crime.

They have tonight, at the very least, to relax. This guy, though – Nagisa doesn’t think he’s capable of it.

 

“It’s just a convenience store!” Nagisa had told him. “Starting small, you know? C’mon, you’ve got nothing to worry about.” Then he’d pulled the mask over Rei’s head (had to get up on his tiptoes to do it, and it was kind of awkward with the glasses) and tugged him inside.

Nagisa is very reassuring, very supportive. Maybe he doesn’t know Rei all that well, but he has the utmost faith in him – he’ll be  _fine_. And he could have refused, if he’d really wanted to. No one ever held a gun to his head, even if the metaphor is strikingly appropriate.

It’s true that Nagisa had no good reason to choose him, true that he has other friends and acquaintances that he might have convinced to join him on this endeavor, but something tells him that Rei is the right man for the job. Also, he is very cute.

After the convenience store job was finished – after Nagisa gave the cashier a thank you and his best smile (not that it was visible, considering the mask) – after the two of them were a safe distance away, he’d looked at Rei and beamed, saying, “Well, I guess you’re officially my accomplice now!”

His friends used to tell him he was terrible, long before he ever embarked on a life of crime. This may be true, he realizes.

He’s okay with that.

 

Rei. His name is Rei, and Nagisa pronounces it with admiration.

Premature admiration, but not unfounded, he’s convinced. He can see it in Rei’s eyes – he has potential. He has  _something_ , and that’s enough for Nagisa. No one ever accused him of making good decisions, but he’s never steered himself wrong before, so he chooses to trust his instincts.

There’s nothing wrong with spontaneity, he thinks.

Rei refuses to get comfortable. He refuses to change clothes or slide under the covers on his bed or watch TV. He is frozen in place, and Nagisa can almost hear him thinking. Overthinking.

“It was exciting, wasn’t it?” He smiles, hopeful, hands floating in front of his chest. Rei only stares at him in response, like he’s an alien life form and Rei is trying to analyze his behavior patterns and calculate the ratios of his features. Nagisa gets this a lot, but it’s never felt quite so mathematical.

His face falls a little.

Chewing his lip, he tries to decide what to say. Maybe this was a bad idea. He thought for sure he was playing hard-to-get (he did come with him, after all), but now Nagisa isn’t so sure. If Rei doesn’t want to –

“You can leave if you want,” Nagisa says, quieter than before. Still smiling, if a little less boldly. “I won’t follow you, and I won’t tell anyone anything. Promise. I’m going to shower, okay?”

He does, and under the spray of hot water he finds himself worrying that Rei will be gone when he opens the door.

 

He isn’t, though.

He’s still there, and he’s still there for days, weeks to come.

 

Maybe it isn’t the first time he sees Rei smile, but it sort of feels like it.

They’ve been driving for an hour at least, no matter how unnecessary it might have been (they were gone before the police even got there, long gone, but it feels like much more of a close call than it was), and Nagisa is periodically checking the rear window and giggling, while Rei drives barely above the speed limit. He is actually capable of being inconspicuous, which is why he is the designated getaway driver. He pulls into a still-crowded parking lot after a while, and Nagisa has sunk down into his seat laughing, glancing at Rei and waiting, waiting.

The corner of his mouth twitches into a barely-perceptible half-smile, but Nagisa bounces anyway, tugging at the sleeve of Rei’s shirt. “Fun, yeah? You have to admit that was fun.”

Rei gives him a sideways glance and then, maybe probably despite himself, smiles wider, starts to laugh. It’s something strange and miraculous, and when Rei tries to cover his mouth, Nagisa leans over the console, wrapping his arms awkwardly around Rei’s shoulders. “I knew it!” he says, grinning, and presses his face into Rei’s shirt. “I knew you were enjoying this.”

It doesn’t take all that long for Rei to peel him off and push him back towards the passenger seat (“I’m tired,” he says, “and you were laughing–” like he needs an excuse), but Nagisa isn’t bothered.

 

They don’t aim very high, for the most part, because Nagisa doesn’t have the patience for careful planning or finesse. It’s gas stations and stranger things (drugstores, the odd sporting goods store or something just for fun), it’s get in, get the money and get out.

It’s very simple, and he likes it this way.

They could do better, but at least doing small, simple jobs means that they have remarkable longevity as – well, it hasn’t been long enough to call them career criminals, Nagisa supposes, but he thinks they can sustain themselves like this for a while. At least, as long as it’s enjoyable – then they can go back to life, or whatever passes for it normally. No one’s ever identified them. No one’s ever caught them. It’s hard to believe, but it’s true.

Both of them twenty years old and apparently crime prodigies. Nagisa idly mentions making little prize ribbons for themselves.

“I – I don’t think that’s something to be proud of, really.” This motel room is smaller, rattier than normal, and they could probably afford better at this point, but it was convenient. Rei has his legs folded, reading something, taking little breaks to stare disdainfully at a stain on the comforter.

Nagisa, meanwhile, is flipping through channels, flopping dramatically onto the bed every few minutes, sitting up and doing it all over again. “Talent is talent!” he responds, smiling brightly. “And we’re pretty good at this. You are fantastic.” He leaps from his bed to Rei’s and sits there for a little while, trying to read over Rei’s shoulder (the book is something unintelligible, Nagisa isn’t even trying to comprehend it).

This is their normal now: calmly discussing armed robbery while Rei pretends he isn’t enjoying himself.

They are lying in bed that night (two separate beds, the only night they attempted to share was early on, and considering Nagisa is magnetically attracted to the nearest warm body, Rei had flatly refused to try that ever again; Nagisa does wonder if he’d be more receptive to the idea now) and Rei’s voice comes up out of the silence, asking: “Why do you do this? I… don’t really understand.”

He is very serious, each of his words carefully pronounced. Nagisa wants to reach across the space between the beds and touch him, just – touch his arm or something, to confirm his real and solid presence – but he doesn’t. “Oh,” he says, and blinks a few times. “I don’t know.” Maybe he should have a story, some fictional tragic history to explain why he went  _bad_ , where his parents went wrong or something. “I could make up a story if you wanted. It’d be more interesting than the truth.”

(The truth: he guesses he had nothing better to do.)

Rei is quiet for a while.

“Then why do you, huh? Why’d you come with me?”

There’s a silence before Rei replies. “You’re a hard person to say no to,” he says.

Nagisa’s face feels hot for no good reason, and he props himself up on his elbow. “What does that mean?” Nothing. “Rei-chan?”

Rei lets out a long sigh. “Go to sleep, Nagisa.”

Eventually, eventually, he does.

 

The thing is that Rei likes this more (and is far better at it) than he’d like to admit.

Nagisa has a bad habit of watching him in rapt admiration – and maybe he should have picked a less distracting accomplice – but it’s hard not to; he looks Very Nice with a gun in his hand, and Nagisa has long since stopped worrying about what that says about his own messed-up sexuality. And Rei has that voice – very serious, very calm when he wants to be – and the composed way in which he can make demands of people makes Nagisa go a little bit wobbly in the knees.

Distraction aside, he counts this as a plus.

Rei is also Utterly And Completely Ridiculous, as evidenced by the fact that he has a notebook (a crime notebook?) to keep track of anything he feels the need to write down: profit, expenses. Nagisa helpfully points out that this would probably be really good evidence were they ever arrested, and Rei adjusts his glasses and says, “Well, let’s not get arrested then.”

He is melodramatic and easily embarrassed and far too concerned about how stupid he looks with a mask over his face, and Nagisa is so,  _so_  smitten with him that he spends half of a car ride clutching at his jeans to try to control himself because he just wants to  _kiss him_  so badly but he’s driving, so that’s probably a bad idea, and eventually he just tells him to pull over and scrambles onto his lap, kissing him right then and there.

There isn’t actually enough room for both of them in the driver’s seat, and Nagisa’s back is pressed uncomfortably into the steering wheel, but he can’t find it in him to mind.

Rei kisses exactly like Nagisa expected him to; he kisses like he learned from a textbook, very carefully and methodically, but it isn’t unpleasant and it’s very endearing. It’s all sort of a mess because where Rei is controlled, Nagisa is frantic, and it takes what feels like an excruciatingly long time before they sort of figure out how to reconcile it, but –

they’re both used to that by now.

And despite the fact that they are an awkward jumble of limbs smashed in between the wheel and the seat back and the door, despite the fact that they’re kissing like teenagers, sloppy, clicking teeth, it takes a very long time before either of them stops, and Rei mumbles something about exactly how far they are from their agreed-upon destination. When he finally takes his hands from Nagisa’s waist, his face is flushed redder than Nagisa has ever seen it.

He calls this a win.

 

Rei has the end of his pen pressed against the tight line of his mouth, while Nagisa is pressed insistently against his side, burrowing under his arm. He has no idea what Rei’s writing in his notebook, but he doesn’t really care.

“Maybe we should try something more complicated,” Rei says, tapping the pen against his lip. “I’m sure I could handle it. The planning, I mean.”

Nagisa laughs into Rei’s shirt. “Look at you, showing initiative. Exactly what I look for in an accomplice!”

“I mean, don’t you ever get bored?” Rei looks down at him, eyebrow raised. “Besides, we could do much better than these motel rooms. We should upgrade to something more –“

“Beautiful?”

“Hush.”

Nagisa pushes himself up ‘til he’s got his face buried in Rei’s neck, hand toying absently with the collar of his shirt. He’s curious again, wants to ask  _why, why are you still here, why are you here at all_ , but Rei has started to tangle his fingers in Nagisa’s hair, and he’s here and Nagisa feels invincible, as stupid as it might be –

and he figures the “why” doesn’t matter all that much.


End file.
